An evening with Walter Mosley.

On February 8, the Dallas Museum of Art will be hosting a virtual event with Walter Mosley in connection with his new novel Blood Grove.

Upcoming online course, African American detective fiction.

Norlisha Crawford, associate professor emerita at University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh who guest edited the Clues theme issue on Chester Himes, will be teaching an online course on African American detective fiction starting in August under the auspices of the Rosenbach in Philadelphia. Authors covered will include Himes, Eleanor Taylor Bland, Walter Mosley, and Nichelle D. Tramble.

The return of Hughes's The Expendable Man.

Today marks the reissue of Dorothy B. Hughes's Edgar-nominated The Expendable Man (1963) by New York Review of Books Classics; this edition has an afterword by Walter Mosley. In Crime & Mystery, H. R. F. Keating called the book, which centers on the death of a female hitchhiker, "one of the great trick novels of crime fiction." Anthony Boucher thought it "a splendid novel."

Christie conf, Mosley panel, Frye issue.

• A Call for Papers has been issued for the September 12, 2011, conference "'Whodunit,' and how have they 'dunit'? Investigating Agatha Christie's Works and Their Adaptations."  It will be held at the University of Derby in the United Kingdom. Go here for the Call for Papers.

• A panel is planned on Walter Mosley's work at November's Pacific Ancient and Modern Language Assn conf; Call for Papers here.

• ESC: English Studies in Canada plans a special issue on critic Northrop Frye in honor of his centenary. One item on the Call for Papers lists "Frye and  . . . detective fiction." Deadline for papers is July 15. Go here for Frye's musings on the appeal of detective fiction.

Vote for your favorite mystery author.

The Library of Congress is asking readers to vote for their favorite authors who have attended the National Book Festival in its 10-year history.  Mystery author possibilities include Nevada Barr, Louis Bayard, Laura Lippman, Walter Mosley, and Scott Turow. Diana Gabaldon currently leads in the voting.

This year's festival is scheduled for September 25.

Walter Mosley, Jewish writer?

In Tablet, a project of NextBook, a nonprofit organization devoted to Jewish literature and culture, Harold Heft makes the case for adding Mosley to the pantheon of Jewish writers (Mosley's mother was Jewish).

Clues 28.1 published: Chester Himes.

Just published is vol. 28, no. 1 of Clues: A Journal of Detection, which is a theme issue on the work of Chester Himes (1909–84) to honor his centenary. Norlisha F. Crawford (University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh) guest edited the issue. Edgar nominee Frankie Y. Bailey (SUNY–Albany) compares Rudolph Fisher's The Conjure-Man Dies (1932) to Himes's A Rage in Harlem (1957); Justin Gifford (University of Nevada–Reno) examines Himes's Run Man Run (1959) in the context of black pulp publishing; Agustin Reyes-Torres (University of Valencia) compares Himes's Coffin Ed Johnson and Grave Digger Jones with Walter Mosley's Easy Rawlins; and Stephen F. Soitos looks at Himes's use of tropes from African American folklore.

An exciting aspect of the issue is its reprint of "He Knew," a short story by Himes that has been out of print since 1933 and is his first work that features African American detectives. John Cullen Gruesser (Kean University, NJ) analyzes the story and discusses its place in the history of African American detective fiction.

Other essays in the issue compare Boris Akunin with Christie and Collins (Marcia A. Morris, Georgetown University); examine Anne Perry's World War I series (Barbara Korte, University of Freiburg); look at the language used in James Ellroy's Dudley Smith trilogy (Jon Clay, Richmond-on-Thames College); and analyze John le Carre's The Secret Pilgrim, his first novel to deal with the end of the cold war (Jonathan Goodwin, University of Louisiana at Lafayette). Edgar nominee Rita Rippetoe (author of Booze and the Private Eye) also reviews Edgar nominee Jean Murley's The Rise of True Crime: 20th-Century Murder and American Popular Culture.

Go here for the table of contents with article abstracts; here for more information about the journal.

National Book Festival: Clips with Connelly, Child, Mosley, Silva.

New video has been added from the 2009 National Book Festival: Lee Child, Walter Mosley, and Daniel Silva. In addition, there's a podcast with Michael Connelly.

Pre-National Book Festival: Walter Mosley.

There's a couple of Library of Congress podcasts available of some of the authors attending the September 26th National Book Festival. Here's one from September 15th with Walter Mosley.

Harvard UP's upcoming A New Literary History of America.

Harvard University Press offers a preview of its September release A New Literary History of America. The following were the only mystery entries I spotted:

• "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," 1841 (piece written by Robert Clark)

• "Hardboiled," 1926 (piece written by Walter Mosley)

• Psycho, 1960 (piece written by William Beard)

John Buchan, Walter Mosley this week on BBC Radio 7.

This week on BBC Radio 7, mining engineer Richard Hannay attempts to thwart enemy spies in John Buchan's classic The Thirty-Nine Steps; also featured is Buchan's Huntingtower and Walter Mosley's Devil in a Blue Dress. Go here for the schedule or to listen.

About the image: Kenneth More as Richard Hannay in The 39 Steps (dir. Ralph Thomas, 1959).